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Tuesday, 12 February 2013

The Messy Job of Finding the Ontario Swing Voter

Today we're going to look for the Ontario swing voter.

On Election night, when we're standing there in front of the TVs, red-faced, waiting for the vote totals to trickle in from some uncalled riding, who's fault is it? Whose hesitation between parties is keeping us from getting some sleep that night?

Building on our prior experience with correlations, we decided to look for the census data that corresponded the closest with small electoral margins.

Small margins = swing voters, according to our thinking. Opportunities for growth for the parties.

The result of our search was rather surprising.

Actually, we'll spare you, because the table is 300+ lines long. You'll find it at the bottom.

A Fantastic Voyage

We are really going to abuse some numbers today. My dusty old social research book should get here soon. In the meantime, let's just go with the numerical flow.

We came up with a long list of numbers and data (the stuff at the very end of this article), saw what looked good correlations-wise, and thought "Hmmm."

It looks like the high school-educated and retail workers have the lowest correlation to high vote margins.

Or, if you look at it the other way, the high school-educated and retail workers should have some of the highest correlations to low vote margins!

Add to that a smattering of young people demographics, and again we were intrigued.

It reminded us of the articles on shifts in support we did earlier. A lot of these constituencies looked like the NDP voters we saw from last time.

The first line, the description of which ends with a "20% data", doesn't mean anything, really. It's the result of a subtotal used in the census data. So we can cross that out.

Looking at the +/- sign of the two ingredients to our "correlision" is important because some of these don't make sense otherwise: The second line suggests that older men, a (+) high-margin demographic (that is, one correlated with high margins in a riding) combined with a (-) statistical aversion for the NDP equals one of the NDP's prime pickup opportunities.

Unfortunately for the Dippers, we've seen elsewhere that older men tend to be conservative, as do those deriving a high portion of their income from "other" sources (e.g. investments). So we've gone and reddened the wrongly-signed rows to avoid wasting our time with them.

What's left? In order, the up-for-grabs demographics for the NDP:

Lived at the same address 1 year ago

Immigrant Before 1991

[Larger] Households

People aged 15 to 24 with no diploma or degree (these people are now 20-29 and might possibly have degrees now OR this might be related to the parents in the ridings back home)

Employed people who ride to work in a car as a passenger

People 15 to 24 in 2006, who have a High school or equivalent diploma (same disclaimer applies)

People reporting hours of unpaid care for seniors

Males 20 to 24 years (now 25 to 29, like your humble narrator)

Unmarried persons

Canadian citizens (that is, not ridings with high immigrant populations)

23 year old women

Separated couples

Those with university diplomas below bachelor level.

Shopping at Targets

Some of these groups make for better strategic opportunities than others.

For example: Canadian citizens (yes, only citizens can vote, but we've been looking at the riding level, not the individual level). It's hard to think up a policy initiative that specifically prompts left-leaning people in low-immigration communities to vote for you. This isn't Québec, after all.

How many people in Ontario are separated couples? In another Excel spreadsheet we've prepared, the population percentages are given for all these census categories in Ontario. We've added those figures to the side of the table, in parentheses.

From the size of these demographics, we can see that some of them don't make sense to target without some especially brilliant micro-targeting of the kind used in the US.

For example: "Females 19 years old" (now more like 24) seem like a hard group to capture. "Are you 24 years old and female? Vote for me!"

Driving Range

At the same time, our diagnosis of the NDP's commuter strategy seems reaffirmed: passengers of cars are one of the top demographics on the NDP "correlision" list, and at 8.3% of the population, carpoolers represent a relatively sizeable chunk of Ontario's voters.

Commuting drivers, another 71% of the Ontario population, are not far behind on the full NDP "correlision" list, at #29 (not shown)

During a recent snowstorm, Andrea Horwath even tweeted a word of warning for commuters:

On the ONDP website, some of this concern shows up in the micro-policies proffered there: 15% cut to auto insurance rates (we just went over car users). 5 day home care guarantee for seniors (Care for seniors is #12 on the list). On-the-job training for youth (young people are, as usual, well represented in our latest calculations for the NDP).

What about the other main Ontario parties?

Ontario Liberal Party

"Correlision"

Correlation to Percent Margin in 2011 (% of votes)

Correlation to OLP, as percent of Votes, 2011

L Correlision

Education 25 to 34: College, CEGEP or other non-university certificate or diploma (76)

-0.232

0.621

-0.144

Education 15 to 24: Apprenticeship or trades certificate or diploma

-0.23

0.594

-0.137

Education 15 and over: High school certificate or equivalent (67)

-0.206

0.612

-0.126

Total population by knowledge of official languages (20% sample data) (47)

-0.2

0.602

-0.120

Persons 15 years and over with earnings (counts) (20% sample data) (110)

-0.27

0.442

-0.119

Employed, 15 and over, transport: Car, truck, van, as driver

-.189

0.610

-0.116

Education 15 to 24: College, CEGEP or other non-university certificate or diploma (72)

-0.204

0.553

-0.113

Immigrant: 2nd generation (58)

-.167

0.630

-0.105

Total population by mother tongue (20% sample data) (45)

-0.2

0.506

-0.101

Labour 15 and over, ind cat.: Wholesale trade

-0.211

0.478

-0.101

Total employed labour force 15 years and over by place of work (20% sample data) (101)

-0.268

0.351

-0.094

Aboriginal responses not included elsewhere (65)

0.25

-0.369

-0.092

Pop 15 and over: Unemployed (88)

-.180

0.508

-0.092

17 years

-0.199

0.457

-0.091

Population 15 years and over reporting hours looking after children without pay (98)

-0.25

0.357

-0.089

Total population 1 year and over by mobility status 1 year ago (20% sample data) (60)

-0.264

0.327

-0.086

Education 35 to 64: High school certificate or equivalent (79)

-.148

0.583

-0.086

Knowledge of: English only

-.149

0.573

-0.086

Median monthly payments for owner-occupied dwellings ($) (44)

-.152

0.554

-0.084

Canadian citizens age 18 and over

-.188

0.436

-0.082

Immigrant Before 1991

-.197

0.412

-0.081

Knowledge of: Neither English nor French

-.146

0.553

-0.081

Total pop, Location of study: No postsecondary certificate, diploma or degree

-0.219

0.369

-0.081

Number of male lone-parent families

-0.249

0.312

-0.078

Households containing a couple (married or common-law) with children (32)

-0.21

0.369

-0.077

The data for the Ontario Liberal party was noisier, but also interesting. Some of the same or similar groups to the NDP are listed here, which makes sense, as they would be the voters up for grabs.

We find here a curious mix of well-educated 30-somethings, and people with high mortgage payments, combined with less prestigious groups: the unemployed (in 2006), high school dropouts, recent immigrants, no official language knowledge, single dads.

Some of these present some obvious opportunities, although I admit to being ignorant as to the electoral politics of the wholesale trade.

Ontario PC Party

"Correlision"

Correlation to Percent Margin in 2011 (% of votes)

Correlation to PCs, as percent of Votes, 2011

PC Correlision

Not in a common-law relationship

-0.252

0.555

-0.140

Education 25 to 34: High school certificate or equivalent (75)

-0.216

0.595

-0.129

Education 15 to 24: Total population aged 15 to 24 (70)

-0.333

0.377

-0.126

Total employed labour force 15 years and over with a usual place of work or no fixed workplace address by mode of transportation (20% sample data) (102)

-0.279

0.446

-0.124

Total population by immigrant status (20% sample data) (49)

-0.2

0.583

-0.117

Total population 5 years and over by mobility status 5 years ago (20% sample data) (61)

-0.262

0.436

-0.114

Females Median age of the population

0.209

-0.499

-0.104

Males 19 years

-0.252

0.401

-0.101

15 to 19 years

-0.212

0.468

-0.099

Males 15 to 19 years

-0.209

0.474

-0.099

Other household types (34)

-.182

0.536

-0.097

Total population by citizenship (20% sample data) (54)

-0.263

0.367

-0.097

Total population 15 years and over by common-law status (100% data) (4)

-0.247

0.377

-0.093

Mother Tongue Other language(s) (46)

-.152

0.574

-0.087

Females 18 years

-0.234

0.366

-0.086

Total experienced labour force 15 years and over by occupational categories (20% sample data) (93)

-0.216

0.395

-0.085

Canadian citizens under age 18

-0.201

0.422

-0.085

20 to 24 years

-0.275

0.307

-0.084

Labour 15 and over: G Sales and service occupations

-0.244

0.337

-0.082

19 years

-0.261

0.314

-0.082

Total population 15 years and over who worked since 2005 (20% sample data) (100)

-0.207

0.376

-0.078

Total population aged 25 to 34 (74)

-.187

0.410

-0.077

Total pop: Visible minority, n.i.e. (107)

-.147

0.522

-0.077

Pop 15 and over, worked in: English and non-official language

-.176

0.411

-0.072

Females 5 to 9 years

-.188

0.383

-0.072

10 to 14 years

-.178

0.399

-0.071

15 years

-.174

0.406

-0.071

Semi-detached houses - as a % of total occupied private dwellings

-.176

0.399

-0.070

Females % of the population aged 15 and overy

.115

-0.603

-0.070

Immigrant 1991 to 2000

-.135

0.510

-0.069

Home sweet common wall

The PCs show some interesting corollaries to the Liberal "correlisions": high school-educated thirtysomethings, people in their 30s generally, People who are not shacking up. Young men (or perhaps their parents?).

Interesting: Why are more recent immigrants apparently more Conservative than pre-1991 immigrants?

People in semi-detached houses, and those who worked in English and a non-official language are interesting categories for the PCs to target.

But what could the electoral strategy for those groups be?

Appendix

Meanwhile, for the data-obsessed, here are the correlations we calculated for margins of victory, mentioned at the beginning of this article.